*@andywhitedc is a DC resident, author and social media manager. His first guest post depicting yet another bad date and entitled "The Layers" can be found here. His second post, also about a bad date (see any patterns here hmm??) "Muted Lights, Small City" can be found here. Comments are always appreciated and thanks to Andy for guest posting. Enjoy.* Guest Post by Andy White
I went in open-minded, excited, ready to be debonair, suave and funny. I remained this way even after she rolled in 15 minutes late and withnot one, not two, but three comrades in tow.
I guess it didn't help matters when she announced that she was 22. Ihad put her anywhere from 26-33 when I met her briefly Saturday night.This age difference was immediately reinforced when she revealed shehad yet to set foot in a wine bar and was seemingly pleased with this achievement.
I pressed on. I tried gamely. Full charm offensive. Her expressionchanged from stoic to glum to nonplussed no matter when was thrown ather. It was as though she had been used to staccato-like sentencesfrom her 22-year-old brethren and that anything more caused undue painto compute.
After an hour of this, she announced that she wanted to see 'what her friends were doing'. Her friends were sitting 6 feet behind us, but nevertheless we turned and moved to sit with them to discover exactlywhat it was that they were doing. And thus began a period of elegantly excruciating awkwardness. She immediately turned her full and complete attention to said friends, refusing to even look in my general direction.
Her friends gamely engaged me in conversation and I madethe best of it, but what became apparent to the point ofridiculousness was that she was either completely and socially ineptto the point of retardation, or she genuinely found me repellent andlikened her friends' banal dialogue to be the stuff of Noel Coward.
For the second hour, the hour with the three friends, the three friends I was still slightly surprised to see sitting right there,right now, with me, we probably exchanged but 20 words.
At the conclusion, the friends looked at me cap in hand: they wanted me to pay.
You couldn't make it up.
13 comments:
Well, did you pay?! I don't care how old you are, this behavior is not OK!
The formatting is all messed up here, so you'll just have to take my word for it that I can write.
Did I pay? Fuck no.
That girl's loss that she was too inept/retarded to enjoy lovely company in a lovely wine bar.
With that said, I'm really glad you didn't pay.
Wow.
I’m just going to launch into Faulknerian commentary and anyone that reads this can follow.
My first question is, where did you meet this young lady (ahem. I think we all know on which word of the last two the emphasis lies...)? It’s not completely clear whether you had met the three in-tow comrades previously when you’d met her briefly on Saturday night… I'm thinking that if perhaps you met her in a bar--a social situation that would have more than likely involved a posse--that perhaps it was not completely unreasonable for her to have interpreted your invitation out on a latter evening to have been all-inclusive. It’s an assumption that would be considered amateur at best and riddled with self-doubt at worst, but something to consider as a possible point of misunderstanding, nonetheless.
It’s unfortunate she was so young… Though not a variable one can control, as a 26-year old, I can confidently say that I have matured leaps and bounds since I was fresh out of college at 22. (And I wasn’t immature at graduation, mind you. OMG, was she even OUT of college?!) It’s amazing what a few years in the harsh, real world can do to you in terms of maturity and the way you interact, socially, but age really can’t be helped; it is what it is. Sure, maturity depends on the individual person, but I think it’s okay to categorize people (max., min. acceptable) for simplicity’s sake. You have to have some sort of general methods to weed through the huddled masses, you know?
From what I read, it sounds like she was intimidated by you. She realized very quickly that she couldn’t hold her own; either she couldn’t relate, wasn’t interested (could alcohol at first meeting made her think otherwise?), or was intellectually inferior to the point of failure.
How did you get along with the three friends aside from game conversation? Any potential there? Also, what kind of date was this? Did you try to just jump right into a dinner at the wine bar or was it just drinks? In my opinion, early dates should always be brief with plenty of opportunities to escape. Invite someone for drinks after work, at an hour no later than 6:30pm, preferably earlier. If it’s going terribly downhill, you can escape after a drink or two; if it’s going well, it can segue into dinner, a movie, weekend plans.
It's sad that it was her first trip to a wine bar. I hope she goes to many more. They are usually quite lovely places.
Andy, please tell me you did not pay.
Did I pay? Fuck no.
Look, if I were a dude, I wouldn't have paid either. Maybe for my "date", if I were a REALLY nice guy, but for her friends? FUCK. THAT.
Who brings her friends on a first date? I mean, even if you are worried about being chopped up or made in to a woman suit, you still shouldn't drag THREE of your friends on a date. Just saying.
Maybe you should take me out, Andy. I'm a nice girl... And I won't bring my friends. haha.
This "date" wouldn't have made it to the two-hour mark. It would have been lucky to make it to the 30-minute mark - unless I decided to turn it into some kind of social experiment a la the Blues Brothers. "How much do you want for your women? Your wife, your daughters, sell them to me." You could have tried to see how far you could push them. Then I might have paid.
Glad you stood up for the brotherhood and didn't pay. That would have made us all look bad.
I love Andy's posts! What I can't figure out is why on earth these women keep saying yes to dates they clearly don't want to be on.
This is so deplorable to me. Has common courtesy gone out the window?!?! So glad you didn't pay.
Holy hell, I can't even believe it. So happy you didn't pay. I don't care how old or young you are, that's just rude and presumptuous. Bitch is right.
andy... i'm so glad you didn't pay. I would have lost some respect if you did.
i can't believe she would invite her friends. I mean i've joked around with my friends about having them show up to an awkward date. but i never never never would have actually allowed them to show up.
-K
Pick somebody on strictly shallow reasons (hot 22 year old) and don't be surprised if you end up being accepted based on shallow reasons (older, less attractive guy who can finance her life).
Andy, I just read all of your bad date posts for the first time. They're bad, but just be glad you haven't had any first dates like I've experienced, including (but certainly not limited to):
1. The overly-eager naked man.
2. Mr. Foot Fetish who accosted my feet from under the dinner table.
3. The guy who went to the bathroom and never came back, leaving me with the bill unknowingly...
I would GLADLY pay for a date with a seemingly normal person like yourself!
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